Government that prohibits citizens from growing food condems them to death

In the past when I read headlines like these, I praised God for giving us the inclination and ability to raise and eat our own food. But now, we're in a battle with the Town to defend that right.

When we purchased our property 9 years ago, we recognized the value of owning land that could feed us. Our priorities have not changed: we don't have a 4000 square foot house in a fancy subdivision, and we can't take vacations to Maui twice a year because of this life we have chosen. But if our economy collapses or all of the commercially available meat is found to be tainted (see article above), we will be able to feed ourselves and our neighbors with what we painstakingly cultivated on our land.

This is our right, given by God, not just to Americans but to every person in the world...from camel farmers in outer Mongolia to goat herders in Pakistan.

In a previous post I mentioned that we received a letter from the Town demanding that we remove our cattle from our property. Though our 7.44 acre property has housed livestock since before the Town existed, the current administrators are attempting to enforce a 20 year old municipal zoning code that excludes any animal you can eat from its list of approved "domestic large animals."

After we rejected the Town's first demand to relocate our cattle, the Town suggested that we apply for a Conditional Use Grant in order to keep our cows. At a non-refundable cost of $100, it holds no guarantee of being approved and can not be transferred to anyone who buys our property. For our family, the thought of paying a municipality for permission to feed ourselves runs contrary to everything our nation was founded on, and is simply not an option. So, true to form, we will stand firm.

We live in weird times. There are people who want the government to provide them with everything, and who live from disappointment to disappointment, perpetually irritated that they're not getting what they want or what the neighbors have. Then, at the other end of the spectrum, there are people who defy authority to provide anything for them, and struggle with age-old challenges to provide everything from food to clothing for themselves. And finally, there are people in the middle--most of America--who are completely indifferent...typical consumers trying to do their part, content to remain blissfully unaware of the struggle around them. Government, is equally conflicted, wanting the role of parent and provider for all mankind so intently that it often cuts off its suppliers to prove its sovereignty. This is the drama that's playing out here in my town.

Town government is not a Homeowners Association. Homeowners may voluntarily enter into a contract with an HOA and sign over their property rights to that private organization for whatever security it offers in exchange. But municipalities may not operate in this way; they are beholden to the Constitution and obligated to defend the rights of the people they serve. It seems that we have become so used to people telling us what we can and can't do with our private property that we've forgotten that it is our our property to begin with. If the Town wants to decide how our property should best be used, it can buy it from us.

Perhaps this latest hurdle is our chance to stamp out tyranny in our own backyard, or perhaps this is a lesson to us all about what happens when government is permitted to run unchecked on the taxpayer's dime. It's time we all remembered that it's not someone else's job to protect fundamental unalienable rights, it's mine and yours.

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Psalm 144

1 Praise be to the LORD my Rock, who trains my hands for war, my fingers for battle.2 He is my loving God and my fortress, my stronghold and my deliverer, my shield, in whom I take refuge, who subdues peoples under me.